Tuesday Thoughts.

Was up at 04:30AM with my bride for coffee, then she headed off to the truck company for her shift. Rigg’s and I skipped our nap this morning and he just laid by my chair in the kitchen. It rain most of the morning and then about noon I saw the sun trying to peak through, so far the sun has made it for the afternoon It is nice and warm and the forecast for the rest of the day is partly cloudy and a high of 95.

Don’t have any plans for the rest of the day I was going to take a ride up to Clarksville MO. with Rigg’s to see if I could meet up with fellow bloggers JOHN & BRIDGETT but I decided to wait until I will have dry and sunny roads, it’s not a bad drive only about 40 miles north of me on Hwy 79 and then west on N to their campground. Donna will be working, but they are going to be at the Escapee’s Rally so if I don’t make it we will see them there. We haven never met, but John is a retired firefighter, and when I was Chief at the Lake I helped on the Lake Sherwood Volunteer FD. which is now part of the New Melle Fire District. As an old guy I usually just manned a broom or a booster hose on grass fires and let the real fire fighting up to the professionals. But I was caretaker of our first truck which was retired in working order, a 56 Mack B Model closed cab Thermodyne Pumper, I used to keep it washed and polished and would take it out for a run about every two weeks, In the summer on holiday weekends when the campground was full I would take it up there and point the booster line up in the air over the front and let it spray a big shower of water on the kids, they loved it but it only had a 300 gal tank so you didn’t last long until you had to fill it, luckily there was a plug right by the restrooms so that’s where I would set up. When New Melle was merged with us we kept the old truck which was fine with them as all their newer equipment had automatic transmissions, and a lot of the younger guys couldn’t drive the Mack because it had a 5 speed with straight gears, no synchromesh, so you had to double clutch it. All of the old timers were glad to see it retired too, although mechanically it was a gem.

                               Sam on Engine # 1.

Finally right before I left they decided the insurance was getting to high for a truck that just sat and they sold it to a church. We never told them what the insurance was on a working fire truck, but they were going to use it like a hay ride vehicle with seats in the hose bay, and take the booster reels off and put seats there too.

I had to take the guy from the church who was supposed to be a member of the church that was a truck driver for a demo ride, you should have heard him when he found it it had the od transmission and NO power steering. Yeah it was a bear to steer when it wasn’t moving down the road.

Well enough history for one day, I’ll bet a lot of towns have there first fire truck and still baby it in display use.

Hope everyone is having a fine day, Be safe out there. Sam & Donna…